Patron Saint of Lost Causes, Live on the BBC: The Yes Men, Humour and the Possibility of Politics

At midnight on December 3, 1984 a Union Carbide pesticide plant in Bhopal, India abruptly and without warning released 42 tonnes of lethal methyl isocyanate gas into the sleeping city. The official death toll released by the provincial Indian government was 3,787, 1 while estimates from other sources suggest that anywhere from 8-10,000 people died within the first 72 hours and up to an additional 25,000 in the years that followed from gas-related diseases. 2 This incident has since been referred to as the “Bhopal disaster” and remains the world‟s worst industrial disaster. Dow Chemical, the company which now owns Union Carbide, continues to deny any responsibility for the tragedy, reiterating on their website that they acquired Union Carbide‟s shares 16 years after it happened (and presuming that in purchasing a company one acquires only profits, shares and products, rather than existent corporate errors, missteps or worse). 3 On a website they maintain outlining the company‟s response to the disaster, Union Carbide also claims no responsibility for the disaster, instead highlighting the central role of Union Carbide India (a company that was in fact owned by Union Carbide) and private Indian stockholders. 4 In other words, Union Carbide worked to deflect blame onto India itself and highlights only what it sees as its extremely vigorous efforts to determine the cause of the leak, which was eventually decided could only have been deliberate sabotage.